Portland International Film Festival: The Best in World Cinema

The Portland International Film Festival explores not only the art of film but also the world around us. Now in its 37th year, the fest showcases the most noteworthy contemporary films from across the globe in an extraordinary range of subjects and genres. This year's installment of Northwest Film Center's annual world cinema showcase features 104 features and 24 shorts at various local theaters.The films encompass everything from comedy to drama and include sci-fi, horror, animation, documentary and more, plus an entertaining shorts program.

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* __Please note that screenings take place at different venues. Please check the correct location and address for the screening(s) you wish to attend.

__**Schedule**:

**Feb. 19, 2014 at 6:00pm: __Code Black

__**__@ OMSI: 1945 SE Water Avenue, Portland__**

“C-Booth,” the trauma bay at the LA County Hospital, was the first, the toughest, and the best training ground for ER doctors in the country. But when the hospital moved to a modern facility, the dedicated medical staff faced a growing crisis. Code Black follows a group of young doctors as they grapple with the divide between their idealistic expectations for improving patient care and the realities of an underfunded and overly bureaucratic system. McGarry—a full-time doctor at the hospital while making the film—explores the frustrations. How and why do they persist in saving lives in the face of thwarting regulations and paperwork? As one doctor states, “More people have died in this square footage than in any other location in the United States. On a brighter note, more people have been saved here too.” (78 mins.)

Feb. 19, 2014 at 8:30pm: The Great Passage**

@ OMSI: 1945 SE Water Avenue, Portland

Mitsuya, a shy young bookworm, is the weakest salesman in his division at the Genbu Publishing Company. When transferred to the dictionary department to work on “The Great Passage,” a 240,000-entry, state-of-the-language dictionary, his passion for language blossoms. But he’s left speechless when he meets Kaguya, his landlady’s granddaughter, who moves into his building and beguiles him with her obsession with cooking knives and fine cuisine. Mitsuya soon finds that the words he has studied his whole life are inadequate to express his true feelings for Kaguya. Meanwhile, complications begin piling up as the dictionary department descends into chaos. Yûya Ishii’s tender and quirky romance is a charming ode to the Japanese lexicon. This year’s Japanese submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. (134 mins.)

**Feb. 20 at 6:00pm: Village at the End of the Word

**__@ OMSI: 1945 SE Water Avenue, Portland__

This rich, real–life human drama, full of humor and hope, is set against the backdrop of steadily melting ice that portends larger ecological changes for the whole planet. The Inuit village of Niaqornat in spectacular northern Greenland grapples with many of the same challenges as other small communities around the world: a dwindling population, a lack of industry and jobs, the traditional giving way to modernity. It also happens to be one of the most remote human habitations on Earth. The film focuses on four townsfolk—Lars, the only teenager, who dreams of another life; Karl, the huntsman who has never really acknowledged that Lars is his son; Ilanngauq, the outsider who moved to Niaqornat after meeting his wife online; and Annie, the elder who remembers the ways of the shamans and a time when the lights were fueled by seal blubber. (82 mins.)

Feb. 20 at 8:30pm: Nobodys Daughter_**Haewon**_**

**__@ Whitsell Auditorium: 1219 SW Park Avenue, Portland__

Why does Seoul student Haewon keep dozing off? Is she depressed by her mother’s departure for Canada? Tired of her relationship with her teacher, the fickle—and married—filmmaker Seongjun? Will the events of the coming weeks rouse her from her listlessness, or will she carry on dreaming? With its focus on fraught male–female relationships, mix of gentle comedy and meditative melancholia, and playful way with narrative repetition and fragmentation, this is clearly a Hong Sang–soo film. In Hong’s view of human foibles, the various men hitting on Haewon are again prone to bathos and self–delusion, while she herself is as insecure and indecisive as an Eric Rohmer protagonist. Like those patience–trying heroines, she’s rightly regarded with bemusement and compassion—wherein lie the film’s wit and charm. (90 mins.)

Feb. 21 @ 11:59pm: Proxy

@ Cinema 21: 616 NW 21st Avenue, Portland

“As a pregnant Esther (Alexia Rasmussen) walks home, she is viciously attacked by a hooded assailant. In the wake of this traumatic event, she finds some consolation and normalcy in the kindly Melanie (Alexa Havins), whom she meets at a support group. But a chance encounter makes it clear that nothing—and no one—in Esther’s life is as it appears. Setting off a chain reaction of increasingly shocking revelations, Proxy twists and turns its way through loss, grief, and death. The surprise standout is auteur Joe Swanberg in a supporting role as Melanie’s husband. Be warned: Proxy begins with some deeply disturbing content, but this immensely challenging thriller will reward audiences who stick with it as it delves into very dark territory and confronts our every assumption and belief about what we have seen.”—Toronto International Film Festival. (120 mins.)

Feb. 22 @ 11:59pm:Coherence

@ Cinema 21: 616 NW 21st Avenue, Portland

A group of friends and ex–lovers learn why you should not throw a dinner party the night a mysterious comet is passing close to Earth in this mind–bending science fiction thriller. The first glasses of wine have barely been poured when tensions start to rise. None of that matters, however, when the lights go off throughout the neighborhood, all except for one house a few blocks over, lit up like a beacon in the darkness. “Coherence is a cerebral low–budget sci–fi that dives headfirst into a pool of quantum mechanics and theoretical physics. It’s a tightly focused, intimately shot film that quickly ratchets up the tension and mystery. Coherence is relationship drama turned on its head, giving you plenty to think about without spoon–feeding you any answers.”—Fantastic Fest. (89 mins.)

Feb. 23 at 2:00pm: Two Lives *

@ Whitsell Auditorium: 1219 SW Park Avenue, Portland

1990. After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War, a flood of information from East Germany makes its way through Europe. Like most Norwegian children fathered by the German occupying troops during WWII, Katrine (Juliane Köhler) was sent to Germany as a child, only able to return to her Norwegian mother, Ase (Liv Ullmann), long after the war’s end. Not all the war children were as lucky—most were never reunited with their parents—and now a German–Norwegian lawyer is building a case against the Norwegian government for its exclusionary policy. Although a victim herself, Katrine fears exposing the darkest secrets of her past. This year’s German submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. (97 mins.) In English, German, Norwegian, Russian, and Danish with English subtitles.

**Feb. 25 at 8:15pm: Child’s Pose

**__@ Whitsell Auditorium: 1219 SW Park Avenue, Portland__

Winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival, this dark tragicomic exposé chronicles the efforts of an overly protective and domineering mother, Cornelia, who uses all of the means at her disposal to keep her reckless adult son, Barbu, out of jail when he is accused of killing a child in a drunken hit–and–run. Cornelia is an educated, wealthy woman, an architect by trade, who views her privilege in Romanian society as a right that extends to her son; she has no qualms about offering bribes or coercing the police and witnesses to lie. But the impassive Barbu, increasingly resentful of his mother’s domination and bullying, comes to realize that he has a say in his fate too. This year’s Romanian submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. (112 mins.)

About the Ticket Supplier: Northwest Film Center

The Northwest Film Center is a regional media arts resource and service organization founded to encourage the study, appreciation, and utilization of the …